Paradigmatic Piety: Liturgy in the Life of Martha, Mother of Symeon Stylites the Younger

• Autores: Lucy Anne Parker
• Localización: Journal of early Christian studies: Journal of the North American Patristic Society, ISSN 1067-6341, Nº. 1, 2016, págs. 99-125
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • In the former work, the stylite's mother features as an important, yet occasional, character.23 She is most active at the start of the Life, which recounts the story of her (reluctant) marriage to Symeon's father John, her success in converting John to a more pious way of life, her vision of John the Baptist proclaiming her imminent conception of a holy son, and her nurturing of Symeon until, at the age of six, he was led by a white-robed man to the monastic community where he spent the rest of his life.24 After this, her appearances in the Life are far less frequent, but nonetheless hint at her importance: both John, the head of the monastery which Symeon joined, and Ephraim, patriarch of Antioch, supposedly mentioned Martha on their deathbeds,25 while she is involved in some of the most dramatic episodes in the saint's adult life, including his response to one of the worst earthquakes to hit Antioch,26 the procession celebrating his elevation to the column in the center of the new church complex on the "Wonderful Mountain,"27 and his resurrection of his disciple Conon after his death from the plague.28 In these episodes, however, she plays only a supporting role, and her own life is paid little attention; we only learn of her death by chance, as a service held in her memory is the setting for one of Symeon's miracles.29 Although she sometimes intercedes with Symeon,30 she never intercedes directly with God, and there is no suggestion that she can perform miracles. "34 This concept of three "models" for female holiness may be too schematic, failing to appreciate the diversity of late antique hagiography.35 Nonetheless, there are characteristics of many biographies of holy women that are noticeably absent from Martha's Life, including, most strikingly, an emphasis on the body, celibacy, and asceticism.36 Apart from a solitary comment that Martha often fasted, especially on Wednesdays and Fridays,37 the author of Martha's Life makes no reference to Martha mortifying her body or shunning fine clothes and jewelry, despite these being dominant themes in much hagiography about women;38 nor does he attempt to excuse her for not maintaining her virginity by stressing either her reluctance to marry or her later adoption of a celibate lifestyle.39 It has been argued that the Lives of women provided more powerfully than the biographies of holy men the hope of redemption for all humankind, since if a woman, a descendant of Eve, could overcome her inherently sinful body and become holy then so could anyone.40 The Life of Martha, however, does not fit into this pattern, given its lack of interest in its subject's body and sexuality. A woman who was both deaf and dumb came to the shrine, asking Cosmas and Damian, "with tears and with faith,"104 if she could die, as her disability was making life unbearable. "Since she had lamented because of all these things and had remained in this supplication with faith towards the saints," God's help, we are told, came to her through the saints' mediation: yet rather than granting her request to die, he healed her completely.105 Her humility, faith, and patience were thus rewarded through the conferring of a boon greater than her original demand. Peter Sarris, Matthew Dal Santo, and Phil Booth, Brill's Series on the Early Middle Ages 20 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 116-17. Besides the Chalcedonian collections edited by Deubner, a Miaphysite collection also survives,